


I cried when my childhood pet died

by natcat5



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, F/M, Sadstuck, a thing for a friend, sorry man writer's block was a butt to me, the end of this was like pulling teeth my bad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-09
Updated: 2013-06-08
Packaged: 2017-12-14 09:25:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/835330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natcat5/pseuds/natcat5
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's hard to have a grip on reality when reality has warped before your eyes for as long as you remember.<br/>It's even harder to say goodbye to someone who used to be invincible and who you've known for your entire life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [teecups](https://archiveofourown.org/users/teecups/gifts).



> A thing for Dana here Dana here's your thing (sorry it took so long)

Death is a funny thing.

It’s like the contents of a snowglobe, you think. Distant, trapped behind a wall of glass. Something that you can look at and observe. Something whose existence you can acknowledge. But ultimately, something that you remain detached from. Separate. Something that you know is there, but remains intangible to you. You can’t see it, you can’t touch it, or taste it or smell it.

Like a world trapped in a snowglobe.

When you were a little girl, you barely knew what death was. You had an island that was full of life, with beautiful flora that never faded or withered, nurtured constantly by the tropical sun. You had a million and one gadgets to cater to your every whim. To feed you when you were hungry, to clothe you when you were cold, to cool you down when you were hot. Every night, you dreamed of a land of gold and white. Of huge reflective clouds that told you where you had to be and when. You floated up, up, and away, and you never had to worry about falling, because you could fly.

It was impossible for you to fall.

The first time you experienced death was when your grandpa collapsed in his chair with a bullet wound in his heart. The splash of red across his suit, the empty eyes, the way his body sagged, and the way his chest no longer rose and fell with breath are burned in your memory.

But it was okay! Because you knew what to do. Just like with the animals that Grandpa had killed, you knew how to make it so that he wasn’t _really_ dead. Just a little quieter! A little more stiff. But still present. Not gone. Never gone.

He didn’t smile at you like he used to, he couldn’t, because the stitches would tear. But he was always by the fireplace, and he was always there for you to talk to, so it didn’t really matter whether he was ‘dead’ or not. You still had him with you, and that was what was important.

Maybe if you had been completely alone, you would have begun to understand what ‘death’ really was. Maybe you would have been able to understand the true finality of it, and not dismissed the its reality so easily. But you weren’t alone. You were never alone for an instant. 

You had a dog that could be at your side in the blink of an eye.

A dog that took care of you and was always there, faithfully watching. A dog that would protect you even before you knew that you were in danger. A dog that couldn’t die, even if you shot at it! A dog that could deflect any danger with ease, teleport anything hazardous away, and still be back in time to tuck you into bed.

You never truly knew death. It was always the inside of a snowglobe.

And then you started playing that game.

It never quite hit you, even when you were surrounded by an entirely new landscape, shivering in the cold with nothing living in sight, that your world had changed. You knew what snow was, but feeling it bite at your toes, turning your skin a bright, angry, red, was something entirely different. Your reminders didn’t make sense to you, and your golden dreams were gone. You had memories of a falling boy, a boy who you had feared would-

would-

**_Die._ **

And you wake up chilled to the bone, and angry, and frightened, with stupid boys and scary girls screaming in your ears, and your grandpa no longer by the fireplace and your dog nowhere to be found.

_You were inside the snowglobe._

But you still didn’t get it.

Because Bec was a floating sprite, but he came back to you, and you knew that John was okay, you remembered seeing it in the clouds. He got your gift. He’s fine. The world was cold, but it was going to be okay. You were going to be okay.

You didn’t think about the vacant spot in front of the fireplace, where your grandpa was supposed to stand.

Little by little, cracks started to appear in the glass walls. You saw Rose and John’s parents, splashed with red and motionless. You saw Dave, with blood bubbling up over his lips, and covering his bright green suit. Splashed with red and motionless. And everything was wrong.

But only for a moment.

Because _phew!_ It wasn’t _your_ Dave. It was just- just a mistake. A little mistake that wasn’t all that bad, and didn’t have any real consequences, because your Dave- the Dave that mattered- was still alive.  

And you were sad for John and Rose, but you were sure they’d be okay! After all, you grandpa died too, and he was still…he was still…

Your mind flashed to the empty fireplace, and the cold spread through your veins.

You started to get scared. Because there was a dog, a big black mean dog that was like Bec but wrong, and he was hurting everyone. Ruining everything. Smashing through the glass wall and letting the snow swirl into your world of sun and life. Everywhere you looked there were more motionless bodies of red without breath and you started to feel the cold grip around your own neck and you-

could feel it-

_for the first time._

The glass was melting underneath your fingers. Melting and cracking and disappearing, and-

_You had to stop him._

The Bec that was wrong was the one that was messing everything up. He was the one who was shattering your reality and making it- making, making things not the way they were supposed to be. Making people stop breathing. Making your friends drown in their own blood.

You had to stop him.

He was Bec but stronger, so you just had to make Bec strong enough to defeat him, and then everything would be okay! People would stop being motionless and stained with red, the glass would stop cracking and melting around your fingers, and you- you wouldn’t be cold anymore.

So you prototyped Becsprite with your stuffed Dreamself. The you that wasn’t you anymore.

And it was sad because you wouldn’t get to talk to him anymore. He wouldn’t be able to bark disapprovingly or nudge you into bed. But he was still there! You could see his fluffy white ears and tail, and the familiar sparks of green…

So everything was still okay, and you still had Bec.

_No you didn’t._

Even when he/she flew away sobbing, when you couldn’t see him/her. When you didn’t know for sure whether they’d be there to catch you when you fell or tuck you in when you fell asleep, it was still okay. Because you knew that they were out there, _somewhere._

And besides! You had much bigger things to worry about. Things were in motion, and you had to coordinate with Karkat and Dave and everyone else to make sure things got done! You were going to win. You were going to steal back the reality that Bec Noir was warping into something horrible. You were going to get out of the snowglobe you fell into, and escape from the world of swirling snow and cold.

_You could do it. Even if Grandpa wasn’t at the fireplace, you could do it. Because while Bec wasn’t at your side, you knew he’d be there in an instant when you were in trouble._

And then, Bec didn’t come to protect you.

It was when the wrong Bec, the black one, came at you snarling and spitting with green fire. You were scared, but you were fighting, because it was okay. You wouldn’t get hurt, you wouldn’t become motionless and breathless and stained with red. That couldn’t happen. You wouldn’t let it happen. Your dog would never let it happen. He/she/they would come back before then.

Somehow, Dave didn’t quite factor into that equation.

It wasn’t like Grandpa, with one hole. He had holes all over, and everything was red. And he didn’t move, or breathe, or make a stupid joke when you screamed and picked him up. When you begged him to wake up.

He was-

_He was-_

But then Karkat contacted you, and told you that Dave would be fine if you kissed him. All you had to do was kiss him, and he’d wake up somewhere else, and be fine.

The glass walls trembled, cracked a little more, but didn’t break. Bec hadn’t come, but it was okay, because no one had died. Not really.

And then you won. You did it! You bred the frog. John was in place to perpetrate the Scratch, and Dave and Rose were on Derse. Still alive.

_For now._

There were things you still had to do. Problems you still had to solve. And you had a moment of panic, a moment of uncertainty, when your connection with Karkat was going, and something strange was descending from the sky.

_Shaving cream?_

It hurt.

It hurt. A lot. And then nothing. A horrible blank spot in your memory that sends chills down your spine and a sick feeling in your stomach.

 _But it doesn’t matter_ because you woke up! You woke up strong, and smart, with powers and dog ears and-

_Bec was gone-_

-everything was going to be okay.

Everything was going to be okay because you could protect yourself now. And all your precious people, all of your friends who you had started to be so scared for- they could protect themselves to. And you’d all be safe, traveling through space to your new destination.

So it was okay if Bec wasn’t with you the way he had been before.

It was okay.

..

..

That was then.

That was in the game.

The game ended, and you lost your powers, and your ears. But you gained a world, and you gained an amazing story to tell, and you _regained_ your dog.

He came back.

He came back.

You knew he would. You knew because something so final as never seeing him again. Something like _death_ was inconceivable. Not something that you could even imagine touching you seriously. You had had scrapes with it. A lot of them. Death’s hands had laid their hands on you, on the people you cared about. But the touch hadn’t lasted, and everything that was supposed to come back did. So it was okay.

It was okay.

It was always supposed to be okay.

You didn’t think much of it, when Bec didn’t spark green anymore. When he didn’t teleport from place to place. It didn’t matter, because the game was over anyways. And you were big enough to know where you should or shouldn’t go without him teleporting you away. And your narcolepsy was no longer a thing (apparently it was caused by a crazy alien spidergirl???), so you didn’t need him to bring you to bed when you unexpectedly fell asleep! It didn’t matter if he didn’t have any space powers anymore, because that was never the reason you loved him anyways. You loved him because he was your dog.

The game ended, and you were happy.

Years pass and nothing changes. Not really. You grow older. You move. Away from the island you grew up on to a place with more people, more interaction. Solitude isn’t an option now that you know what it’s like to be surrounded by friends.

You get a job- not because you have to, but because you want to, and because staying at home isn’t as fun when ‘home’ is no longer a tropical island paradise.

You go and see your friends, and you talk to them online when you can’t make the trip. You chat with Dave about all the same things you used to talk about, for the most apart. Because Dave isn’t as comfortable talking about his collection of dead things anymore, and you think it’s because he was touched more by those cold hands than anyone. That he spent more time in the frigid interior of that stupid snowglobe than all of you combined. He hates still, motionless things more than you do, and his wardrobe consists of a lot less red than it used to.

You talk to John about his prank ideas and about his fast developing career as a comedian. You talk to him about ghosts as well, as he’s even more interested in them now that he’s spent time with actual ones, and you love talking about the scientific aspects of ghost hunting with him.

You talk to Rose about all sorts of things. More girl stuff than you used to, now that you have a better idea of what girl things actually _are._ You know she used to talk to Roxy about things like that, and you know she misses her a lot. You also know that she’s trying her best to reconcile with her mother, and rebuild the relationship that they never actually had. Rose also seems to be worried about you, living alone as you are, out in the wilderness. Often going on trips to obscure parts of the world to mingle among all sorts of cultures and people. You hate being alone now, but you can’t live anywhere where there’s a lot of people, like a city, or even in the suburbs, because you get claustrophobic if you’re not close to nature. So you live in a house surrounded by nothing but forest, but leave frequently for trips around the globe.

You have enough money to last you for three of your lifetimes, but Rose is still worried about you, and she often asks how you are. She asks how Bec was as well, especially lately. You always tell her that _he’s fine of course!_ But one particular conversation strikes a sharp rap on that old snowglobe that you had thought you’d left behind. Rose asks you how Bec’s doing, and you tell her that of course he’s fine. She replies with, _Are you sure? I’d recommend taking him to a vet for a checkup. He’s getting on in his years, isn’t he?_

And that

just

doesn’t make any sense to you?

Because Bec’s been around for your entire life and he’s never needed a vet. And something like age has never been an issue. Old? Bec? What does that even _mean?_

You laugh and stress your words like you’re in one of Dave’s funny comics, because it doesn’t make sense. Bec doesn’t _get old._ Bec is Bec! He’s a dog, but…not. He sparks green and can catch bullets and-

You pause.

You pause for a second in your thoughts and somewhere you can feel a sharp crack appearing in that snowglobe. Because you remember that Bec doesn’t spark green anymore, and doesn’t teleport from place to place. And you wonder if maybe he _is_ just a dog, and if maybe you should be worried.

But the thought slides away, because that’s ridiculous.

It’s ridiculous!

It’s _ridiculous._

Even when Bec’s looks like he’s limping as he follows behind you on the street, and a random passerby comments that it looks like he has arthritis, and when his eyes start to blink too often and look like they’re covered with a white film, and when he doesn’t follow you around anymore, but spends most of his time lying in patches of sunlight, not moving, just lying. Even then, you still think it’s ridiculous. Because it is! Because it’s Bec. And stuff like old age, stuff like _dying_ of old age is silly to even think about.

You’ve never known someone who’s died of old age. You can’t even imagine such a thing occurring, knowing that there are so many worse things to die from, and knowing that you don’t have to worry about any of them! Because something like death isn’t something that can touch you, not anymore. Not now that you’ve left that game.

So when you wake up one morning and don’t find Bec by your bedside, and you call his name and walk all up and down your house and still don’t find him. When you ignore the scratch of worry in your chest and keep pressing on, sure he’s just playing hide and seek like he used to when you were younger, when you were both younger. And then you find him, all curled up under the couch downstairs, not moving, not barking, not breathing and

He’s not covered in red, but

He’s not hurt, not covered in bullet wounds, no slit throat, but

And he hasn’t been blown up by a falling bomb of shaving cream, but

but

But you know, you _know,_ and you can’t make sense of it. At all. Your mind doesn’t believe, your _heart_ doesn’t believe, what your eyes are telling you.

And you don’t

know what

to do.

Death is a funny thing. Death is something you can see and look at, something that has curled its hands around you and your friends. Something that has touched you, and made you cold. But something that has always let you go. Something that has always released you back into the sunlight, into the warmth.

You kneel by Bec’s side and his chest doesn’t rise and his eyes don’t flutter and you know this isn’t the same as the other times. You _know._

And you don’t

know what

to _do._  


	2. Chapter 2

Death is a funny thing.

It’s like fire, you think. Once it touches you it leaves a burn that will never completely heal. And even when it doesn’t touch you directly you can feel its heat, feel the smoke clogging your lungs, hear the screams of the people it consumes.

Sometimes you rub at your chest and back and imagine dozens of tiny metal pellets bursting through your skin. You remember the feeling of blackness swallowing you up at a dizzying speed and you turn up the music in your headphones to blast the memories away. You taste copper on your tongue at the most random fucking times, and have to stop whatever you’re doing to make someone hasn’t slit your throat without you realizing it.

Sometimes you stare at your brother’s chest like you’re expecting a sword to come stabbing through it. You watch his white shirt for the first sign of red spreading across it, and on the odd chance you catch him sleeping you find yourself utterly disturbed by the sight of him unmoving. You need him to be moving, always. You can’t stand the sight of him lying still.

You remember tossing your own dead body out the window and you don’t collect dead things anymore.

Death has left burns all over you, ugly, vicious scars that choke your heart and mind. It’s fucking awful, and there are days you don’t even want to get out of bed.

But you do, and you keep moving forward, because you’re not dead. You’re _alive,_ and like hell you’re going to let some bad memories screw up the new life you’ve been given. Your world is back, your brother’s back, your friends are here with you, and you have no intention of messing this up. The game was a fucking bitch but it taught you a few things about yourself, and about the people around you. You’re not living in your bro’s shadow anymore and can almost look him in the eye as an equal.

It helps that meeting Dirk alerted you to the fact that your brother was, in fact, human. And that trying to have an actual conversation with him might be in the best interest for both of you.

So you did. You talked. And then you strifed, because old habits die hard. But Bro has death scars on him too, and he wants to make this new life count as much as you do.

_Everyone_ wants to make this new life count. John and Rose have both worked their asses off to actually try and cultivate a decent relationship with their parents, while also pursuing the career paths their counterparts in the Alphaverse had. You yourself aren’t interested in becoming a director. The idea intrigues you, but unlike Dirk’s Bro, it’s not necessary for you to try and overthrow a spacewitch through subversive messages in film. Instead, you turn to your other passion, photography. Your website is getting really popular and the commissions you’re raking in are almost enough to equal an actual job. You’re also getting requests to take pictures at weddings and birthday parties in other fucking states and you’re actually considering moving out now that you have an actual job. It’s not the money that’s the issue. It’s that Rose made a good point when she said that living alone without a job or any solid purpose was a oneway road to depression, especially considering the amount of mental trauma you were all sitting on. You snarked at her about it, but didn’t doubt her words for a second. Nothing good would come of you being in an empty apartment with nothing but your own thoughts.

Which is why you’re all so worried about Jade.

She says she’s fine, that she has her dog and all the people that she meets on her travels for company. That you all worry too much, and that she’s happy being able be to explore all the corners of the world, and then return to her quiet home in the boonies and cuddle with her dog.

You still worry though, especially as the years go by, and you have to stop yourself from typing ‘that fucker is still alive’ whenever Jade starts talking about Bec. Because dogs don’t live this long. You’re all in your twenties, and Jade said Bec has been around since she was a baby. It was okay when he was some kind of omnipotent demonbeast, but now that he’s normal…

Rose gripes at you a lot about how she doesn’t think Jade has a good grip on reality, but you’d always respond with sarcasm, or snark, or comments about how it’s impossible for any of you to have a grip on reality when you’ve watched reality be ripped to shreds before your eyes.

You don’t want to worry about Jade, because you’re having enough trouble keeping yourself together. _And_ because she seems happy. Really happy. And you’re afraid that if you confront her, if you try to talk to her about what’s going on in her life…

That her world will come down crashing down around her. That she’ll become aware of how fragile what she has is and…break.

You’re probably being overdramatic though. You’ve always had a bad habit of underestimating Jade. She’s capable, and tough. Tougher than you at least. She’s literally held five worlds in the palms of her hands. She made it through that hellish game and you doubt that there’s anything on this newly reformed Earth that can faze her. She’s a survivor, just like you are. She can handle herself.

At least

That’s what you thought.

It starts with Jade not answering her pesterchum messages, which is a little strange because she’s usually the quickest to reply back. You don’t dwell on it though, because maybe she’s in the middle of a trip or on a plane or something, even though she didn’t mention leaving the last time you spoke. You’re not too worried, because she does that sometimes, just takes off without any prior warning.

But a week passes, and then two, without any word. Even John is getting worried, and Rose wants to fly out to Jade’s house if she doesn’t get word soon. But Jade lives on the west coast, literally on the opposite end of the country to Rose, and it’s a hell of a long way to go if it turns out that Jade isn’t even at her house. You tell Rose to sit her ass the fuck down and stay in New York.

You go to visit Jade yourself.

You end up driving instead of taking a plane, since there’s no way you’d be able to get a taxi that would drive you to Jade’s house in the middle of buttfuck nowhere. It takes you about two days, and you arrive at Jade’s house on the evening of the second day.

She doesn’t fly out to greet you. Bec doesn’t come barreling across the front lawn to jump at you and try to cover you face in slobber. The lights in the house don’t turn on, and there’s no sign to show that anyone has noticed your approach. There’s no sign that the house is occupied at all.

But her car is in the driveway, and you have a bad feeling twisting in your stomach, so you walk forward, up the stairs, onto the porch, and to the front door.

She never locks her door, so you don’t bother knocking, turning the door handle and walking in.

You find her curled up in a ball on her bed, wrapped in blankets with the lights off. She doesn’t stir as you enter her room, and doesn’t make a sound as you sit down on the bed beside her, licking nervously at your lips as you try to think of something to say. You’ve always been a man of too many words. Verbal diarrhea is practically your trademark, and you’re a master at saying absolutely nothing in 1000 words or more. You got better at giving advice and talking to people towards the end of playing that godawful game, but when it comes down to it, you’re no good at finding the right words when it counts.

But Jade is hurting, right beside you, and god you cant just sit here like a fucking ass and not do anything. You need to say something, anything to let her know that you're here for her, through whatever shit she’s going through.

But you don’t know what’s wrong, and you don’t want to say the wrong thing.

But you can’t just sit here and do nothing.

You just

don’t

know what

to _do._


	3. Chapter 3

It ends up being Jade who finally breaks the silence, stirring slightly, curling up tighter so that the foot that was sticking out from under the blankets is pulled up into the rest of her body. She turns her head slightly so that her face is turned towards the man sitting at her bedside.

“I don’t understand,” she says hoarsely, “I thought we were out of the game. I thought we won.”

Dave is silent for a few long moments, first out of surprise at hearing her voice, and then out of grim contemplation. His hands curl up into fists at his sides and he tries to find the words that won’t break this girl anymore than she’s already been broken.

“We are out of the game,” he says finally, his own voice a little hoarse, “We did win. Jade, what’s wrong? Seriously, I can’t- I’m not-.” He huffs, a shuddering release of breath as he turns away from her, biting his tongue to stop from tumbling into his practice of rambling when he’s nervous.

“Please talk to me,” he says finally, after seconds of tense silence, “Whatever you’re going through, whatever the fuck’s wrong, you don’t have to go through it alone. None of us ever have to go through anything alone ever again. Because we did win, we did get out. Together. And if you’re hurting than the rest of us are hurting so just fucking talk to me so we can slap a giant bandaid on whatever scrape you’ve got on your heart.”

Jade shudders underneath her blankets, and curls up tighter for a second, before she sits up abruptly, still wrapped up, but with her head uncovered, and her eyes, puffy and red, staring directly at Dave.

“If we’re out of the game,” she says, her voice choked with tears, and her entire form trembling as she pulls the blankets closer about herself. “If we’re out of the game, then why did he die?”

Oh.

_Oh._

And in that moment Dave swears he is the most unobservant fucktruck this side of the galaxy because how the hell did he not notice Bec’s absence. Like hell Bec wouldn’t be curled up on the bed right beside Jade if she was feeling shitty. He might not be an omnipotent superpet but he was still her dog and was still technically the one who had raised her for a good portion of her life. But he’s not curled up beside her. He’s not anywhere in the room.

Or anywhere in the house.

Fuck.

“Jade, I’m so sorry,” Dave whispers hoarsely, running his fingers through his hair and swallowing thickly. His mouth opens, as he tries to think of something to add, but for once, the words don’t flow.

“I don’t understand,” she repeats, shivering, “I just don’t _understand.”_

There are a hundred and one things that he could say, but none of them seem appropriate, not now, not when Jade is staring forward with vacant eyes and her entire body trembling with shakes. Talking is something that needs to happen, not just with him, but with the other two people that make up their fucked up ‘I survived the apocalypse’ family. But they’re not here right now. There’s only him.

So Dave scoots closer, and wraps his arms around her, pulling her into his chest and running his finger through her hair. Letting her turn her head and sob into his shirt while mumbling ‘I don’t understand’ at different intervals.

“The thing about death is,” he murmurs, half to himself, half to the girl he’s rocking gently in his arms, “It’s impossible to understand. It makes no fucking sense whatsoever. You can’t fight it, or guard against it, or really do anything to stop it when it fucks you over in the middle of the night. But,”

He swallows thickly, and rests his cheek on the top of her head,“But you just gotta keep on living. Even if death takes every single fucking thing you hold dear. You gotta keep on living. That’s the only way to beat it. The biggest ‘fuck you’ to death is going on with your life and showing it that no matter how many scars it leaves on you, how many ways it hurts you, you won’t be conquered. And you’ll roll back onto your feet, shoot death the bird, and carry the fuck on.”

He falls silent, and there are a few long minutes that stretch between them.

“I’m not sure if I can,” she says finally, in a small voice, still strained with past tears, “I’ve never had to live without him before.”

“Yeah, well,” he replies, pulling her closer to himself and reaching down to clasp her hands with his, “No one’s ever sure. That’s what family is for. To support you when you can no longer support yourself. So don’t let this beat you, alright Harley?”

She takes a deep, shuddering breath before letting the blanket fall away from her shoulders, tilting her head upwards so that her eyes meet his. She can’t quite muster up a smile, but she’s able to blink away the tears, and lock her fingers with his.

“I won’t let this beat me, Strider.”  

**Author's Note:**

> You can always tell when I've given up on writing something because I switch to 3rd person present tense. Anyways, crappy ending aside, I hoped you liked this, Dana! 
> 
> Hey this was a really fast thing other people who are not Dana it was a super fast thing so yeah I wrote this super fast yeah


End file.
